Wednesday, June 15, 2016

Why external organisations must not be allowed to tell Ireland how to protect its most vulnerable ... by Cora Sherlock

We’ve become
quite used to various prochoice groups in Ireland chanting their slogan “repeal
the 8th” as if it were a mantra for a new, enlightened time rather
than a means to erase the basic right to life of an entire group of human
beings from our Constitution.

But recent
events have shown a new, sinister development – the emergence of external
groups who are trying to influence the Irish Government on whether or not to hold a referendum
on abortion.

Last week
was a prime example of this. The UN Human Rights Committee criticised Ireland’s
abortion laws, saying that they are “cruel,
inhuman and degrading” according to Article 7 of the International Covenant
on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). The UNHRC has a shocking record when it
comes to protecting human beings damaged by abortion. It has never taken
countries like England and Canada to task for the appalling abuse of denying
medical treatment to babies who survive abortion. It ignores the rights of these babies not to
be subjected to “torture” as outlined in Article 7. In its remarks last week,
this same Human Rights Committee didn’t bother mentioning the fact that Article
6 of the ICCPR states that “Every human
being has an inherent right to life.”

The bottom
line is that the UN Human Rights Committee is more and more becoming a parody of
a group that is genuine about its commitment to the protection of human
beings. It no longer speaks from a strong foundation of human rights protection. The Irish Government should not
feel pressured to adhere to its commandments.
Yes, it’s true that we signed up to the ICCPR but we didn’t sign up to
be beaten into submission on the issue of protecting the right to life of
unborn human beings by a group that no longer respects the intrinsic dignity and worth of every human being living in our society.

Let’s move
on to look at the group that helped this complaint make its way to the UNHRC – the
Centre for Reproductive Rights (CRR).
This is a global abortion lobby group.
The only reason for its existence is to introduce abortion where no
abortion takes place. Its
website even has an interactive map highlighting how far individual countries
have “progressed” towards the CRR’s ultimate goal of unrestricted
abortion (Ireland is coloured "red", presumably because we're not playing ball).

It goes
without saying that the Irish Government should not be swayed or influenced by
this international, well-funded and focused lobby group. But the
fact remains that the CRR was in Dublin last week, supported by a number of
prochoice groups as it pushed forward with its global agenda and causing a
media frenzy that continued for several days.

Why should
we, the Irish public, care about the intentions of a foreign abortion lobby
group that acts in this way, helping to bring a complaint to the UNHRC against
the Irish Constitution? The answer of
course is that we shouldn’t. Just as we shouldn’t
care about the interference of the UNHRC which produced a report that resulted
in an appalling criticism of matters that have been decided by the Irish
public.

In an even
more brazen attack on our right to decide such sensitive matters for ourselves,
the UNHRC produced a “Questions and Answers” session on its website, presumably
to reassure anyone in Ireland who might feel a bit uncomfortable about being
told that we have to give up on this wild notion we have that human lives
shouldn’t be ended – even when a “Human Rights Committee” tells us
otherwise.

When asked
whether the UNHRC were “telling Ireland to introduce abortion”, one of the
Committee members, Sarah Cleveland said that “with respect to the Irish electorate”, the Committee had been
presented with different perspectives on the opinions of the Irish public.

But here’s
the problem – the UNHRC seems to have forgotten that it’s the Irish electorate
who decides the laws of this country.
Not the UNHRC. Not the CRR. And
these comments, not to mention the entire report, show a complete disregard for
the will of the People when it concerns the protection of unborn human beings,
enshrined in the Constitution. We’re
relegated into the place of second class citizens behind these groups that
claim to tell us how to protect human rights in our country.

Of course,
we shouldn’t pay too much heed to the comments.
After all, in the very next sentence of this reply, Ms. Cleveland expounds
on what is perhaps one of the best explanations of why the right to life must
be protected, regardless of campaigns to remove it:

“But fundamentally, human rights are
not the subject of public opinion polls.
Human rights exist precisely to protect individuals whose rights may not
be adequately respected by the majority.”

Luckily in
Ireland, we’ve known this for some time.
Since 1983 to be exact, when we took steps to acknowledge the rights of
vulnerable human beings in Irish society and enshrined the 8th
Amendment in the Constitution. It is now vital that the Irish Government
remembers the importance of this act and stands firm against any attempts to
initiate a referendum, particularly those that originate outside the State from
international lobby groups or UN Committees that are human rights protectors in
name only.